by Mark McDermott
Video by Brad Jacobson (@iambradjacobson)
It was a match that seemed set up for comeuppance.
Mira Costa High School’s nationally top-ranked boys volleyball team faced its bitterest archrivals, No. 2 Loyola, whom they’d beaten twice already this season, most recently a week ago in a dominating three set sweep to claim the CIF Southern Section title.
Beating any team three times in a season is famously hard to do, much less a rival who has been nearly as dominant, going into Saturday’s match with a 25-4 record.
But for Mira Costa, the third time was more than a charm. The Mustangs prevailed in a hard-fought, emotional five set match that included a controversial red card and some unlikely heroics.
The 14-25, 25-20, 25-12, 19-25, 15-5 victory at Mira Costa earned the Mustangs the CIF State SoCal Division I Regional championship and, more significantly, a place in Mustang volleyball history. Mira Costa is the first team in the program’s storied history to repeat as regional champions, a fact that Coach Greg Snyder said meant as much to him as the trophy.
“It means a lot for this program, mainly because Mira Costa is a volleyball school. We’re the sport that actually is up at the upper echelon of teams and is there consistently,” Snyder said. “The reason this match is big is because this is the first time in Mira Costa’s long volleyball history that we repeated as regional champs. So that makes me extremely proud as a coach for these guys. These guys put in so much hard work and effort the entire season. Because of what was at stake and their ability to make history, they went for it. They did everything they could possibly do. I can’t imagine there being a harder working team in CIF or the nation, and I think all those things paid off for us, walking away to victory tonight against a very good team.”
The match itself was nothing like the sweep a week earlier. Loyola, energized by a boisterous student section that led the national anthem after technical difficulties at the start of the match, came out as the aggressor and stayed there for most of the opening set. The Cubs scored seven of the first nine points and rode the play of outside hitter Nate Garrett to a 25-14 win, snapping Mira Costa’s streak of 15 consecutive postseason sets won.
“I thought Nate Garrett played phenomenal on the outside,” Mustang setter Jake Newman told the Daily Breeze. “And I thought if we limit him, we have a very good chance to win the game.”
Garrett would finish with 21 kills, but Mustangs did find a way to limit his impact, particularly in the second and third sets, when Mira Costa took control behind the all-around brilliance of junior outside hitter Mateo Fuerbringer. The UCLA-bound Fuerbringer finished with 28 kills and four aces. It was his service game as much as his hitting that turned the match. He recorded seven of his kills, two blocks, and two aces in the second set alone, the second ace giving Mira Costa set point.
“There’s not enough adjectives to describe Mateo,” Snyder told the Breeze. “He’s good at every facet of the game and serving is just one of those aspects.”
The Mustangs dominated the third set 25-12, with senior middle blocker Wyatt Davis (six kills, four blocks) and senior Colby Graham (four kills, three blocks and an ace) doing much of the damage. Davis capped the set with a block that gave Mira Costa a 2-1 advantage in sets.
Loyola refused to fold. The Cubs answered in the fourth set behind Garrett, taking seven of the first 10 points and holding off a late Mira Costa rally. Lucas Posell’s block on Fuerbringer forced a decisive fifth set.
What happened next was the night’s pivot. Following the fourth set, Loyola was assessed a red card, giving Mira Costa a 1-0 lead before the fifth set began. Loyola coach Michael Boehle did not hide his frustration.
“To get the red card going into the fifth set wasn’t deserved,” Boehle told the Daily Breeze. “Both teams play together on club, so they get chippy with one another and that kind of took the wind out of our sail a little bit. It’s tough to start one down.”
Mira Costa never let Loyola back into it. Newman opened the fifth set with a block, and senior libero Justin Warner followed with an ace to put the Mustangs ahead 3-0. They closed the match on an 8-2 run, capped by senior Enzo Barker’s match-clinching kill — a fitting punctuation for a team led by a group of mostly unheralded seniors whose grit has defined the season.
“I personally think it’s more the seniors that are overlooked, guys like Colby and Enzo, guys like Jake Newman, guys that aren’t going anywhere [to play DI college ball],” Snyder said in an interview last week. “They want to show people that they’re good volleyball players too. All those guys have a grit and grind to them that is really unmatched.”
For Newman, who transferred in this year and stepped into the setter role vacated by last year’s USC-bound senior Andrew Chapin, the fifth set carried a weight beyond the scoreboard. It was the Mustang seniors’ last home match.
“Especially as seniors, it’s our last game we’re ever going to play together at home,” Newman told the Daily Breeze. “It’s an amazing arena with this crowd, and we’re like, ‘It’s the fifth set, let’s give it everything we have.’ And that’s just what we did.”
The packed Mira Costa gym Saturday night underscored what longtime South Bay sports broadcaster Chris “Geeter” McGee, a former professional beach volleyball player and the voice of the AVP, sees as a singular fact about the local sports landscape.
“In this community, volleyball is kind of the main sport, especially for boys, and that’s why you see the great crowds,” McGee said. “When you go to the SEC, it’s all about Georgia taking on Auburn, and it’s about Alabama LSU. For us, this is what it’s about. And again, tonight it showed why it’s the best match. It went five, both teams phenomenal, well coached, but the stars — Mateo Fuerbringer taking over at the end — pretty, pretty special.”
Mira Costa, now 36-2, will face Northgate of Walnut, the Northern California Regional champion, in the CIF State Division I championship match Saturday, May 30, at Fresno City College. The Mustangs are the defending state champions, having won the inaugural Division I state title last spring.
Assistant coach Eric Fonoimoana, the 2000 Sydney Olympics beach volleyball gold medalist and a Costa alum, said the team is not done yet.
“This is a big win for us. Loyola is a very talented team. We knew that coming in. We knew it was going to be a battle,” Fonoimoana said. “I didn’t know it was going to be that kind of a battle, but I’m proud of the kids. When it came down to winning special points in the long rallies, I thought we put a lot of pressure on them. This team is working extremely hard. We haven’t lost in a long time, and I think it’s because of the work we put in.” ER
